How to Use Social Goals to Increase Performance

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Sep. 6, 2011, 10:26 AM

"What is your greatest weakness?" We all dread this question, whether it's at a job interview or a performance review. As cliche as the question may be, the answer to it can be insightful if you really consider how you'll answer it. The real question is: What is it that keeps your performance from being better?

Is it your organizational skills? Do you have a hard time prioritizing projects? Are you not very good at communicating with your colleagues and/or your manager?

Whatever the answer is to this question, that's the key to increasing your performance. Once you figure out that answer, then you'll see that to in order to help yourself, you have to be more social. If you're a manager, and your employee comes to you with an answer, you need to use social goals to help them better their performance.

Maybe you're a little disorganized. The obvious solution to this is to set goals to correct this, and then write them down and follow through. How about you take it one step further? If it's hard for you to stay on track with a goal, you can have your co-workers hold you accountable. You don't have to email them to let them know what you're working on, telling them to should check on your progress if they haven't heard from you. What if all you had to do was enter your goals in your company's internal social network and make them available to your colleagues? Voila…accountability!

It's possible that you take on too much, overwhelm yourself and then have trouble prioritizing. This is probably because you only focus on the big goals, without setting smaller, more manageable goals in between. In order to prioritize, make sure your goals are well-defined. This will help you — and anyone else on your team that is relying on the progress of that goal — to move on to the next step.

Are you having a hard time communicating with co-workers because you're a telecommuter? Throw in different time zones to the equation and you could have a real mess on your hands — which just may grow your weakness and affect your performance. For managers, managing a virtual workforce is a vital skill. For workers in general, identifying the weaknesses in communication, and addressing them with a cure that includes social goals, will help take performance to the next level across the board.

So, tell us, what's your biggest weakness?

Morgan Norman is the Founder and CEO of WorkSimple, a Social Goal management program, and is passionate about building the first performance management designed for all employees. Connect with him and WorkSimple on Facebook and Twitter.